We are currently in Croatia, having entered Europe (via Munich) with our Canadian passports. Our bikes are due to arrive soon, however, we envision staying in Europe for longer than the 90-day period that Canadians are allowed in the Schengen Zone.

We are both dual citizens, I have a UK passport and my wife has a Croatia passport. The reason why we didn't enter Europe with these passports is that we did not have them at the time, but do now.

Two questions:

1) Can we stay longer than 90 days just by carrying around our UK/Croatian passports?

2) If we bring the bikes in, is it better to register them under our UK/Croatian passports? How will that work if we are stamped into Europe on our Canadian passports? Will we have to be stamped out and then back in with our UK/Croatian passport? Also, the bikes are Canadian registered. Is it a problem registering CDN bikes under a UK/Croatian passport?

Any help or advice is appreciated.

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Gene - http://www.RideDOT.com

As far as I can see you can stay forever with UK/Croatian passports if you want.

Others might know different but if you enter the EU through a land border with your Canadian registered bike its entry will not be recorded and you can travel around on it for up to six months before it will need to be registered here or taken out of the EU.

You can stay as long as you like on your EU nationality, rather than passports. However, I think you may complicate matters for yourselves with the actual physical lack of an exit stamp on your Canadian passports.

I also have dual nationality, but I have always entered (and been stamped in) as a certain nationality and been stamped out in the same passport so as to avoid some officious border pr1k having a reason to hassle me to over why I was stamped into a country,but not out.

Very easy to solve though, exit the EU i on your Canadian passport and then enter Montenegro/Serbia/BiH on your UK/Cro passports. Just turn around and reenter Croatia then using your EU passport and all potential future problems are averted. You basically swap nationalities in no mans land.

Be wary of EU border crossings (entry from non-EU countries) they like everything to be 'just so' and can in my experience be utterly painful to deal with.

Registering Canadian bikes onto EU plates may be easier or harder depending on the year, make and model and the country you are in. If you want to go that road, you will need an address and be prepared potentially for some eye watering import duties (varies by country) and hassle as regards getting the vehicles 'inspected'. The EU is legendary as a dual buerocracy, each country has its own ludicrous hoops to jump through as well as a second set created by the diktat of Brussels! You will soon discover why it is very hard to do anything of a business nature in the glorious fatherland........

Sorry EU. :st ormy:

Deleted due to logic error in my post (didn't read OP's question carefully enough). Sorry.

Ibid.

Hi all, thanks for the responses.

I got in touch with a Croatian customs agent and she told me what everyone above is saying:

a) Croatia is not part of the Schengen Zone yet (July 2015 is the slated date)
b) Our CDN bikes have to be brought in under our CDN passport
c) Citizenship does not equal residency. The import of a personal vehicle will require proof of residency.

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Gene - http://www.RideDOT.com

A, correct
B, is not necessarily true throughout the whole EU polyglot
C, also depends upon which country you are referring to and to complicate that even further, actually attaining 'residency' varies widely between EU states.

Also there is nothing to stop you bringing in bikes on your Canadian passports and then remaining in the EU on your EU passports.

You have no idea how complicated the EU is. I spent 3 weeks dealing with a Russian official/inspector for an export consignment and he spent a lot of time standing behind the EU ministry officials groaning at how slow, inefficient and utterly anal they were. And to think when we first started the process we were concerned that it would complicate matters having an official Russian shadow. It really reminded me of how pathetic the EU is.

No matter what you do, you will be in contravention of some idiotic EU directive in some way.

As has been said possibly not true throughout the EU, I am sure you could bring it into the UK on a UK passport and register it here with just an address. I am presuming that by registering it you mean getting a local number plate and not just recording its entry with customs?

Not an issue in the UK as you do not get stamped out of the UK, regardless of passport.

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Gene:

Just a 'head's up' for you on a slightly different but very closely related matter:

As long as your bikes have Canadian plates on them, DO NOT allow anyone else to ride them while they are in the EC. Doing so puts you at risk of having import taxes imposed on the bike immediately, along with a corresponding penalty.

I learned this the hard way a few years ago. I had my Canadian-plated bike in Germany, and loaned it to a good friend (Austrian citizen, EC resident) for two days. He was stopped by German police in a routine traffic check, and the police determined that by the very fact that he (not I, the tourist) was operating a vehicle that had not been properly imported into the EC, full import duty and taxes were due on the bike, as well as a penalty amounting to 100% of the duty and taxes. The whole bill added up to well over €2,000.

Hence my advice to not let anyone else ride your motorcycles until you get the Canadian plates off and the local (European) plates on.

I also suggest you be very careful about doing anything that implies establishing your residency in the EC without simultaneously getting the bikes plated in the EC. In other words, if it appears you are resident in the EC, rather than a bona fide tourist in the EC, you could get nailed for not properly importing the bikes, as they would no longer be considered as 'tourist vehicles temporarily imported for pleasure purposes'.

In the context of the above paragraph, there could be certain advantages to you having entered the EC on your Canadian passports (rather than EC passports). As you pointed out, citizenship does not equal residency, but the whole matter is a lot 'cleaner' if you are 'all-Canadian' on the transaction.

Michael